Fall Down, Go... | This young Rault can do it all himself; all he needs is a tambourine and some duct tape.
w/ Daniel Moir. Nov. 1 (8pm). The Hydeaway (10209-100 Ave). Tickets: $10 at the door.
“I’ve always been more of a solitary writer,” says Michael Rault.
“A lot of the originals on are older originals that I wrote on my own but never really fit into what [my former band] The Mixed Signals were doing. Once I started playing solo shows, I realized these songs really lent themselves to a more minimal setup, and they are what eventually became my first solo album.”
When he puts it that way, it seems inevitable that the local 19-year-old musician would dissolve The Mixed Signals in favour of the long and often lonesome road of the solo artist. After all, when the logistics of keeping a band together (and happy) becomes more trouble than it was worth, why not simplify?
“I was having problems finding people who were enthusiastic about playing in the Mixed Signals,” Rault explains. “Even when I had people in the band, it was hard getting everyone together to practice and play shows and whatever. It was just getting harder and harder to maintain a band and a positive atmosphere in general.”
The turning point came when the old Blackspot Café approached him to play a solo show after many failed attempts to book Rault along with his band. “The Blackspot wanted to book me before it closed down,” Rault says, “but I had to keep turning down their offers to book The Mixed Signals because I couldn’t get a full line-up together at that point. The show turned out really well — I got a really good reaction, so I started concentrating on that instead.”
Other than a brief reunion with The Mixed Signals earlier this year when they were crowned Band of the Month by local radio station Sonic 102.9 FM, it’s been a steady stream of shows featuring only Rault, a tambourine taped to his foot, an acoustic guitar, and an amp. Because he only has to account for himself, Rault has been able to perform any and everywhere around town, even bringing his youthful blues to art shows for surprise (and, in the words of SEE music columnist Fish Griwkowsky, “ass-kicking”) performances.
“It’s been a lot of fun, and a big relief not having to worry about the things that you do when you have a band,” Rault says. “Which is the same thing I found out when recording Doing it on your own is nice because everything you put on it is because you want it there, rather just throwing in drums and bass and guitar all the time, as having a band kind of dictates.
“At the same time,” he continues, “I was learning how to play a bunch of old R&B and blues songs for my solo shows, and that really fuelled the writing process for me. These songs gave me a bunch of ideas how to write and arrange my new original material and how to rewrite and update the stuff I had in the vault. I felt like I had so much freedom, since in the end I had the ultimate decision how a particular song was recorded, even though it was always a collaborative process with whoever played instruments on the songs.”
was produced and engineered by Champion City Records studio wizard Eric Cheng, the successor to former Rault producer Nik Kozub, who worked with Rault on a three-song CDR single entitled Sure Are Fun two years ago. Cheng and Rault first hooked up when Rault was asked to contribute this summer to Willkommen in Spreepark — a combination art installation, play, and concert which Cheng helped organize and produce.
“We recorded the accompanying triple-disc CD at Eric’s studio along with the other bands who performed one of the three nights Willkommen ran,” Rault says, “and I was really happy with the way the material sounded. It was released technically as The Mixed Signals, but by that point I was playing mostly solo shows and I did a lot of the work for that on my own in the studio.
“After that, I was really excited to bring some of my own songs to Eric’s studio, because the songs we played on the Willkommen disc were covers of Spreepark songs, one of Eric’s bands. It worked out really well; Eric really knows what he’s doing. is everything I had hoped it would be.”
Rault is set to officially release this Saturday at the Hydeaway. He will be co-headlining the double release party with Daniel Moir, who will be releasing fresh music of his own in the form of a new EP, The Country and the Sea.
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